HUNTSVILLE, Alabama -- For his acoustic-blues album and tour
with Detroit guitarist Motor City Josh, the Australian-raised musician known as
Harper is giving his trusty didgeridoo a rest.

"What we wanted to do, "Harper, 46, says, "and the reason we
called (the album) 'Bare Bones,' is we
wanted to get back to 'porch style' blues, where you're just playing these wonderful
riffs and singing along. Let's go back to what we grew up with and loved and
leave it like that without adding any other things."

On Dec. 4, Harper and Motor City Josh will play a free 9
p.m. duo show at Humphrey's Bar & Grill (103 Washington St.) featuring "Bare
Bones" tunes such as the title track, "Blues is a Feeling" and "Why Can't We
All Just Get Along." When called for this phone interview, Harper, who plays
harmonica and sings on the LP, is chilling at his 11-acre spread outside Ann
Arbor, Mich., having recently returned from some Midwest shows.

Harper, what do you
think blues music gains when it's recorded and performed live acoustically?

You see how good your actual songwriting is. I think if your
songs can come across without all the extra instrumentation and still hold up,
it probably means it's a pretty cool song.

Growing up in Australia,
what was your exposure to the blues?

I think England was really big on blues music when it wasn't
so big in the States, and you had all those bands in the '60s take on the form
and play it their way. And I was born in England, so I started listening to
blues music with my grandfather when I was 11-years-old. Even at that age, I
picked up a harmonica and started playing around with it.

I was 11 when I moved (to Australia). And my grandfather was a big fan of Sonny Boy
Williamson II and he loved the guitar of Bukka White, too. And Muddy Waters was
certainly one of his favorites. I love (Waters') voice, it's just haunting.

Because there was such an influx of British people coming
into Australia, the music came with it. The blues thing in Australia is huge.
It's one of the biggest music scenes in Australia, especially the public radio,
they were big on playing it and had special shows for it.

I thought it was the most honest form of music. That's why I
wanted to stay with it.

Australia has
produced some great rock bands, like AC/DC and INXS. Why has that country been
a rich source for rock?

Oh yeah, there were some fabulous ones, the famous ones like
AC/DC, INXS, Midnight Oil. But also there were other ones too, like Cold Chisel
is a favorite of mine, that were fantastic. It's really a blues-rock style.
With Australia, there were a lot of venues around that put on bands. At one
point, Melbourne was the second-largest music scene in the world. The only
thing better was Austin, Texas. You can
keep working there, five, six nights a week.

And we did keep ourselves busy there for a while, but I did
want to see the rest of the planet and experience the American culture, because
that was the music that I loved.

How did you and Motor
City Josh get together for the "Bare Bones" LP?

What actually happened was last year we were asked to do a
food bank festival, and they asked Josh to perform and they also asked me, and
I didn't have my band and Josh didn't have his. So when we got there, we just
said, "Oh, do you want to just do something together?" And we basically pulled
out all the old blues songs that we knew.

We started playing together and said, "This would be really
fun, to do this music that we love so much," and we got into this Kickstarter
thing and our fans helped us raise the money to do it. So there was no pressure
on us, to fork out thousands of dollars to help get it going. Generally people
who like Josh's music like mine and vice-versa. It's easy for his guitar playing
to fit right in with my harmonica style.

You mentioned your Kickstarter
campaign, which in mid-September surpassed its fundraising goal for "Bare Bones"
of $3,000. One of the pledge rewards, at the $500 level, for that includes the
backer's choice of an in-home guitar, harmonica or didgeridoo lesson. Have you
guys given that lesson yet, and do you have a cool story from it?

The one person that pledged that much money was a friend of
Josh's, and I asked (Josh) about it and he said, "He's actually a better
guitarist than me. He doesn't need a lesson. He just wants to help us out." And
we found that was the case with a lot of people. Even though we offered a lot of
different things, some people go, "Don't worry about it. We just want to see
this happen."

I think the key to doing something like Kickstarter is to not
overstate how much you need.

There's a Harper
Radio channel on Pandora. What artists come up on that besides you?

Smashing Pumpkins, believe it or not. A little bit of blues.
Some Chris Whitley, who I love. I haven't listened to it a lot because I like
to listen to other people's music besides mine, so I've been listening all over
the place.